Created by the bailed-out General Motors, the Chevy Volt has been an unmitigated disaster. The car was meant to be an environmentalist dream. It would combat global warming by reducing carbon emissions and would one day free us from our dependence on evil oil. But that’s not quite how it turned out.
To ensure the car could be called a “success,” GM stacked the deck by doing two things. First, they limited the release of the car in 2011 to big liberal cities: Washington, D.C., New York City, Austin, Texas, and California, with subsequent roll outs in other liberal states, and then all fifty-seven states by November 2011. This was meant to make sure that plenty of environmentalists would be on hand to buy the car, so GM could report brisk sales. Further, they limited the initial production run to 10,000 to ensure they would have more demand than supply and could report a sell out.
They even gave it all kinds of incentives. For example, while the car has a suggested retail price of $40,280, buyers get: (1) a $7,500 federal tax credit under the TARP bailout, (2) a $1,500 “state” rebate through the state’s Clean Vehicle Rebate Project (more federal money), (3) a federal tax credit for the purchase and installation of the charging unit, which is listed at costing $490 plus installation, but which Consumer Reports says costs around $2,000. That’s $11,000 in subsidies to buyers.
And that’s on top of the $2.4 billion in direct subsidies given to GM by the federal government, i.e. you, to develop the Volt, not to mention the $27 billion given to keep GM afloat so they could make wonderful cars like the Volt.
That’s a lot of federal help. So how did GM do? After thirteen months of sales, GM has sold only 7,997 cars. . . they couldn’t even sell the full 10,000 they made. To give you a comparison, the Toyota Prius sold 159,000 cars in the same period.
And that’s just the beginning of the morass.
See, it turns out the car ain’t as green as they made it out to be.
The Volt actually includes a gasoline engine. So in that sense, the car is not a true electric car, but is instead a hybrid. And if you calculate the “fuel economy rating” the same way it is calculate for other hybrids, the Volt only gets 48 miles per gallon, making it one of the worst hybrids. So GM objected and argued that it was unfair to treat this car as a hybrid and instead demanded that the car be tested using only the electric engine, i.e. that the EPA pretend the owners can use the gas engine. According to GM, that would result in a fuel economy rating of 230 miles per gallon.
Team Obama, the definition of more-ass, happily agreed to play along with GM’s fraud and tested the car in the new way. But even then it couldn’t come anywhere near GM’s claims of 230 miles per gallon. Instead, they found 93 miles per gallon in electric mode and 37 miles per gallon in gasoline mode, for an overall 60 miles per gallon. By comparison, the EPA rates the Prius at 51 mpg. Also, to get the 93 mpg, you need to drive it at low speeds on the highway.
It gets worse. The EPA also measured the tailpipe emissions and found 84 grams of carbon dioxide per mile using gasoline and “nearly zero” using electricity. But a study in the UK which calculated the emissions from the electricity used to charge the battery resulted in 199 grams per mile for the electric motor. Not only is that more pollution than several other cars, but that means you actually pollute less using the gasoline engine in the Volt than you do using the electric engine. Imagine that.
And then there’s the other problem: it’s a death trap.
See, it turns out that when the Volt gets in an accident, particularly from a side hit, the batteries can be damaged. This leads to a coolant leak which causes the car to catch fire. But it doesn’t happen right away. Instead, the fire can start minutes, hours, days or weeks later. In one instance, the car caught fire three weeks after the collision. GM claims to have fixed this by adding padding to the car, but has had to offer to buy back “a couple dozen” cars from people who are now too scared to own them. A couple dozen is around 5% of the total number sold.
And that’s not the only problem with the batteries. GM put an 8 year warranty on the batteries, but estimates right now are that the battery will need to be replaced every six to eight years. The cost of that replacement? $10,000. In other words, every six to eight years, you need to put in $10,000 to keep this turkey running. Given that the resale value is expected to fall 51% in three years, that means the car is effectively disposable. . . talk about a pollution nightmare!
It’s no wonder no one wants this car.
This is what happens whenever the government gets involved in the subsidy business. No rational business would ever try to make this car. It’s too expensive (GM apparently isn’t even making money on the current prices), it pollutes more than the evil polluting cars it’s meant to replace, it costs too much to own and it’s dangerous.
Moreover, it’s fixing a problem that apparently even Global Warming enthusiasts are starting to admit doesn’t exist – according to data released by the same enthusiasts who brought you climate gate and who have repeatedly said every single year for over two decades “this year was the hottest year on record,” the world stopped warming in 1997 and has been cooling ever since!
In an age when Obama’s folly can be seen in “green tech” companies going down in flames like bankruptcy dominoes after being handed mongo Federal cash, the Volt still stands out at the zenith of stupidity.... and you’ve paid $2.5 billion dollars so far to support that stupidity. Makes you proud, doesn’t it?
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